


This Ain't Middle School

by GraarPlacemat



Series: Imagine Erejean Thingies [1]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Eren is short, F/M, Rule 63, a mention of Marco/Eren
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-21
Updated: 2014-06-21
Packaged: 2018-02-05 14:52:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,637
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1822408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GraarPlacemat/pseuds/GraarPlacemat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There was nothing that pissed Erin off more than boys acting like her height automatically meant she was a delicate little flower.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This Ain't Middle School

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote a little fic based on "http://imagineerejean.tumblr.com/post/88969927188/this-is-so-cute-i-wanted-to-write-a-ficlet-but-i" from my current favorite blog! I requested an Imagine Erejean with a really short female Eren being frustrated about her height difference with Jean and the mun’s response was so cute I had to write something for it!!
> 
> Some little clarification notes;
> 
> -Cisflipped Eren is Erin  
> -More of my “Modern AU Hannes adopts Eren and Mikasa and sometimes Armin” thing because this is my forever headcanon and you can never stop me  
> -There is a singular mention of MarcoEren because reasons  
> -Annie and Eren bromance because other reasons  
> -Kaleidoscope Eyes by Panic! at the Disco is my Erejean song  
> -1656 words  
> -I will very likely be filling out more Imagine Erejean things in the future because I love this hecking blog
> 
> I hope you enjoy!!

There was nothing that pissed Erin off more than boys acting like her height automatically meant she was a delicate little flower.

She was petite; there was no denying it. There’d been a brief time, way back in middle school, when it had looked like she’d get a growth spurt, had even been taller than a good number of people in her grade, and then she’d just stopped growing and everyone else had shot up like weeds. For a while, people still gave her the respect she’d earned by being an overall badass, but it only took one kid realizing that she barely came up to his shoulder before people gushing over how “cute” and “precious” she was became the norm.

“Teach me how to beat people up,” she demanded once of her best friend, Annie. “I can’t stand it anymore. I gotta teach those jerks a lesson.”

“Nah,” Annie grunted, feet propped up on her bed, absorbed in her Nintendo DS. “You’ve just got to learn to put up with it, like the rest of us little ones.”

“You don’t put up with it. You beat people up.”

Annie just shrugged, all attention on her game.

Beating people up, in the end, was a bust; Erin learned a little by trying to imitate what Annie did, but poundings didn’t occur frequently enough that she could pick up enough to become proficient. She had to come up with her own solution.

And so, after an entire summer of practicing, Erin entered high school with a new mandate; she would never leave the house without at least an inch and a half’s worth of heels on. Armin raised his eyebrows at her, Mikasa shrugged, her adoptive father Hannes patted her awkwardly on the back, but the comments about her height were reduced enough that she returned to her previous level of confidence.

High school passed for her without considerable conflict; she graduated slightly behind her siblings and with particular proficiency in easily maneuvering while wearing heels up to five inches tall, even able to jog comfortably in three inches. The former tomboy had abandoned sports in favor of theatre, where she could wear heels without hampering her performance. Wedges, platforms, high-heeled sandals, and peep toes replaced her old running shoes, out of which she only kept one pair for use when she was sure no one was looking.

Well, no one except her family, anyway.

“Presenting your natural stature today?” Hannes commented when he saw her in sweat pants and without heels. She stuck her tongue out at him. He chuckled and ruffled her hair.

“Need some help reaching that top shelf?” Armin asked when she clambered onto the counter to retrieve her favorite cereal. She glared at him. He raised his hands in a gesture of surrender.

“Oh, my god,” Mikasa remarked, stopping her as they passed each other and bending to pinch her cheeks. Erin slapped her hands away with a scowl.

Her senior year summer passed, too, and despite a short experiment as the girlfriend of a boy she’d known for a long time named Marco, it was also pretty anticlimactic.

College, though?

College was a different story.

It wasn’t to say that she did a lot of partying; she experimented a little in the first couple weeks, but decided it wasn’t really her thing.

The problem was her classmate - to be specific, a pretentious Frenchy jerkwad in her debate class by the name of Jean. He was tall, he was chiseled, he was exotic, and he was  _hellafucking annoying._

“I think,” she remembered saying once, “that, considering the current state of our economy and how it’s run, Hamilton -”

“But that’s not what we’re talking about, is it?” he interrupted her, standing up despite the professor’s weak objection, “We’re talking about what was best for the union within this time period. And since the United States was still a budding nation, Jefferson’s economic focus -”

“ _Sit down and let me finish my sentence, asswipe,_ ” she hissed, leaning across her table, eyes wide with fury.

“Oh, I’m scared now,” Jean deadpanned, voice sounding almost bored.

“Both of you, sit down and let somebody else speak.”

Their relationship continued in much the same way from that point, arguing furiously with one another any chance they got - until they gradually began to realize that talking to each other was kind of fun, if they didn’t let anger get in the way. Even their arguments devolved steadily into banter, which devolved steadily into flirting, which one day resulted in Jean saying, “Hey, Kaleidoscope Eyes.”

“Yeah? And don’t quote Panic! at me, when we both know Fallout Boy’s a million times better.”

“Ha, ha. It was a compliment, doofus. Wanna go out sometime?”

She blinked up at him. “Um. Sure. That sounds great, actually.”

“Okay. Uh… Friday?”

“Sure.”

So they went out together, to the fanciest restaurant two broke college kids could afford, before deciding the atmosphere was complete bullshit and they jumped ship to get fast-food tacos and walk outside together, contemplating the universe and laughing at each other when taco sauce dribbled down their chins, dripping on their fancy clothes. And it was good - so much more natural than her time with any previous boyfriend, so much more -

_Fucking hell._

“Fuck, Erin, you okay?” Jean exclaimed, gripping one of her palms, holding her off the ground while her ankle throbbed painfully.

“Heel broke,” she grunted, letting Jean help her upright, keeping her weight on her remaining heel, realizing after a second that she’d have to take it off to walk comfortably. Shit. Fuck. She didn’t want Jean to realize how small she was - she didn’t want him thinking she was some dainty thing that needed protecting.

Despite her seething fury, she complied when Jean offered to help her get the other shoe off - told him no when he offered his own shoes in a ridiculous effort at chivalry - and started back to the dorms, side by side with Jean.

“You don’t have to come with me,” she grumbled at one point, gripping her shoes tightly in either hand, not quite feeling brave enough to just toss them in the trash - these were her lifeblood, the reason she’d gotten through school without defenestrating someone, after all. They were like a security blanket; maybe she couldn’t wear them, but if Jean made some comment about her height, she could still maybe gouge his eyes out with the remaining stiletto.

“It’s okay,” he said, a tad confused, “I like being with you. I’m… sorry about your shoe.”

Somehow, this just dug under Erin’s skin even more, and she just continued walking stiffly towards the housing area. After another moment, she felt a gentle hand on her arm, and looked back to see Jean frowning at her in concern. “Yeah?” she asked.

“What’s wrong?”

Erin pursed her lips, looking down at her bare feet. “Um. Just the shoes, you know. Kinda pissed that it was made so… cheaply…” Her eyes wandered back up to Jean’s face, which immediately told her he wasn’t buying it. Wow, his face seemed so much farther away than usual. This gave her another twang of irritation.

In her peripheral vision, she saw Jean’s hands lift, questioningly, towards her face. He cupped her jaw, angling her face up towards his, and this made her even more frustrated. He was still so far away, and what the fuck was with that expression? It was almost like he was amused or something.

“You know it’s not a problem that you’re short, right?” he asked her, catching her off-guard. “I’m a tall guy. I’m used to it.”

Oh, god, so that’s what he was thinking now? Erin rolled her eyes, caught between calling him a moron and gushing over how adorably sweet he was - but the former would make him think she was mad at him, and the latter, well, wasn’t really her style - so she just mumbled, “It’s not that I think it’s unattractive.” He raised his eyebrows, prompting her to continue. “It’s just… I - you would understand if you’d known me in middle school, okay? I don’t want to seem diminutive… Weak, i guess, is the word.”

For a moment, he just stared down at her, a blank expression on his face, hers still cupped in his hands. Then, all at once, he released her and burst out laughing.

“Wha… I…” Erin sputtered, watching Jean grip his stomach in his mirth. “Well I - I’m fucking serious, you asshole!”

“N-no, no, that’s not it,” Jean choked out, wiping a tear from his eye, “It - it’s just so ridiculous, picturing you being weak.”

She frowned at him, not understanding. “Well, plenty of people seemed to think I was, back when I didn’t wear heels everywhere.”

“Well, trust me,” he replied, finally shaking off the last of his peals of laughter, the corners of his mouth still curling upward, “You’re the only girlfriend I’ve ever had that pinned me down by fucking  _arguing_  with me. You think that’s something a weak person can accomplish? You’re the strongest person I know. I mean it.”

Erin blinked, not quite sure what she was hearing. But after inspecting his expression, that unfamiliar softness behind his eyes, she knew he was telling the truth. Slowly, she felt her face break out in a smile. Unsure what to do with her hands, which still loosely held her mangled shoes, she gave him a halfhearted shove.

“Let’s just get back to my dorm, Romeo.”

“Wait, am I getting laid for that?”

“Oh, shut up.”

“I am! I  _am_  getting laid for that!”

Erin just shook her head, still smiling, and went up on her tiptoes, leaning in to him but not quite able to reach. “Fucking -”

Before she could finish her expletive, Jean closed the distance between their faces.

**Author's Note:**

> The Tumblr post;  
> http://missplacemat.tumblr.com/post/89463576938/imagine-erejean-thing-1


End file.
